Richard Wakefield is an American poet, literary critic, and a Professor of Humanities. He is the author of three collections of poetry (see below), as well as hundreds of articles published both in print and online. He has taught at the University of Washington Tacoma, and The Evergreen State College. He currently teaches at Tacoma Community College. Early life Richard Wakefield was born on July 1, 1952 to Edward Henry Wakefield (1917-1994) a sporting goods salesman and Louise Renee Wakefield, née Herzberg, (1918-2000) a homemaker and landscape painter. He is the youngest of three sons. Richard spent the majority of his childhood living in the Pacific Northwest, living in the Wallingford neighborhood of Seattle, Portland, OR, and five years in southern California. His interest in literature took root at a young age, with a fond childhood memory of working through a bilingual copy of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. Poetry also became a part of Richard’s life at a young age, with his first poem published at the age of 15 in Medford, OR. Much like his poetry, Richard is deeply rooted in the Pacific Northwest, with prominent figures who helped build and showcase the region in his family tree. He is a great-great grandson of Robert Wakefield, a structural engineer and contractor who helped build major bridges, rail lines, and water systems throughout Washington and Oregon spanning the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He is also a grandson of Paul Herzberg, a noted Pacific Northwest landscape painter of the early twentieth century. Education Richard graduated from Sorona High School in 1960 and began college courses in the fall of 1960. After completing his AA at Fullerton College, Wakefield enrolled at Cal State Fullerton where he majored in English. It was during his time at Cal State Fullerton that he met his future wife, Catherine Wakefield (née Taylor) through mutual friends and family. Richard and Catherine, who earned a degree in Sociology at the University of California Riverside, married in the summer of 1973 and moved north to the Seattle metropolitan area, where Richard enrolled at the University of Washington for his Master of Arts degree in English and Creative Writing. His Master’s thesis remains the unpublished novel titled The Goat Woman. He continued on to the PhD program at UW, earning his degree in his doctorate in English with a concentration in American Literature under the direction of Jack Brenner and Roger